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POW
by Debby Frazer
It has now been eight years since the
first American pilot was captured in
Indochina. As of Sept 1, 1972 over 500
American men are held as prisoners in
Viet Nam, Cambodia, and Laos. Over
1,200 others are listed as missing in
action.
As the nature of .American involvement in the war changes from ground
combat to air war, thé prisoners take on a
special significance: for many Americans,
they are the only concrete reminder that
the war in Indochina is still going on.
But more than being just a reminder,
the Nixon Administration now claims
that the captured pilots are actually the
reason the war continues:
The only way we're going to get our
P.O.W.'s back is to be doing something
to them [the North Vietnamese] and
that means hitting military targets in
North Viet Nam, retaining a residual
force in South Viet Nam, and continuing
the mining of the harbors of North Viet
Nam. (President Nixon, quoted in The
New York Times, July 9, 1972)
The Legal Question
Destroy the village in order to save it;
bomb the North to get the pilots back.
Such Orwellian logic invites a closer look
at the P.O.W. issue.
They've [the North Vietnamese) already
agreed to abide by the Geneva Conventions, and then have just absolutely
disregarded them. (Secretary of Defense
Melvin Laird, Oct. 22. 1971)
The Geneva Convention Relative to
the Treatment of Prisoners of War
(1949) is the international law governing
treatment of P.O.W.'s. It covers such
areas as mail, packages, inspection of
camps, medical care, and release. The
D.R.V. (Democratic Republic of [North]
Viet Nam) ratified the Convention in
1957, with one reservation: that prisoners
guilty of war crimes or crimes against
humanity, as defined by the Nuremburg
Tribunal, would not be protected by the
Convention.
Because of U.S. bombing of civilian
targets in North Viet Nam, and the use of
antipersonnel bombs against civilians—
both of which are well-documented by
Western journalists—the D.R.V. maintains
that American pilots are not obeying the
international rules of war, which prohibit
such attacks against civilian targets, they
cannot claim protection under those same
rules of war.
The D.R.V. has always insisted, however, that it treats P.O.W.'s humanely.
They say that the basis of their treatment
of the prisoners is humanitarian concern,
since the international law does not apply.
Treatment of P.O.W.'s
Much of the popular concern in the
U.S. with the P.O.W. issue rests on the
fear that American prisoners are being
mistreated. The only evidence for the
charge that the North Vietnamese are
torturing prisoners comes from the statements of one man.
Navy Lieut. Robert F. Frishman, a
former prisoner, was released by the
North Vietnamese in August, 1969. In a
press conference shortly after leaving Viet
Nam, Frishman and fellow ex-prisoner
Apprentice Seaman Douglas B. Hegdahl
stated that food, housing, and medical
treatment had been adequate, and they
assured relatives of the Americans left
behind in the North Vietnamese camps
that they had no cause to worry (AP
report, San Francisco Chronicle, Aug. 6,
1969).
After one month of treatment at
Bethesda Naval Hospital, Frishman
changed his story. During a press conference, he said a fellow pilot, Richard
Stratton, had
been tied up with ropes to such a degree
that he still has large scars on his arms
from rope burns which became infected.
He was deprived of sleep, beaten, had his
fingernails removed, and put in solitary. . . . (American Prisoners of War
in Southeast Asia, 1971; Hearings before
'.he Subcommittee on National Security
Policy and Scientific Developments of
the Committee on Foreign Affairs,
House of Representatives. March and
April, 1971, p. 499. Hereafter called
P.O.W. Hearings.)
Over a year later, after the torture
stories had been through numerous revisions, Frishman told Pulitzer Prize-
winning journalist Seymour Hersh: "I
never said fingernails were pulled out of
Stratton. I never said he lost fingernails."
(P.O.W. Hearings, p. 502.)
The contradictory nature of Frish-
man's statements cast doubt on his credibility. He is also the only one out of nine
prisoners released by the D.R.V. in 1968
and 1969 to make such charges. Other
returned prisoners, such as Hegdahl, have
complained of solitary confinement and
harassment by villagers in areas of heavy
bombing, but none have charged brutality
or torture.
Other released prisoners and American
civilians who have visited P.O.W. camps in
the D.R.V. give favorable reports on
conditions. After a visit with 10 captured pilots, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark stated:
I've seen a lot of prisons in my life.
These 10 men were unquestionably humanely treated, well treated. Their individual rooms were better and bigger than
the rooms in essentially every prison I
have ever visited anywhere. (The New
York Times, Aug. 15, 1972)
The three P.O.W.'s released Sept. 18,
1972 appear to be in good health.
Government Challenges
The U.S. Government challenges the
authenticity of the reports that P.O.W.'s
held by the North Vietnamese are treated
humanely:
If Hanoi wants to demonstrate to the
world that these men are being treated
humanely and are receiving proper medical treatment, it must permit inspections
of prisoner of war camps by impartial
groups. (Secretary of Defense Melvin
Laird, news release, June 6, 1970)
One important reason that the D.R.V.
has refused official inspection of the
P.O.W. camps is their fear that if the
United States knew the location of the
camps, they would conduct more armed
commando raids, such as the one on
Sontay in November, 1970. This fear
appears to be well-grounded:
Question: Do you expect to use
military efforts, that is to say, something
akin to the raid of a week ago?
Answer: We are going to make every
kind of effort to free our prisoners of
war. . . .
Question: You're not ruling out further military action?
Answer: I would not rule out any
action.
"{Secretary--of Defense Melvin Laird answering newsmen's questions, Dec. 1,
1970, shortly after the Sontay raid.)
The Nixon Administration also charges
that North Viet Nam has refused to
provide a list of captured pilots. In fact,
the D.R.V. has provided such a list to
several U.S. Senators, including Edward
Kennedy, and to the Committee of Liaison with Families of Servicemen Detained
in North Viet Nam. The U.S. Government
rejects these lists on the grounds that
they are "unofficial."
American officials also complain, that
the number of letters received by families
is not as high as specified by the Geneva
Convention. There is, however, a regular
flow of mail administered by the Committee of Liaison. As of September, 1972
more than 7,500 letters had been received
from P.O.W.'s, and an indeterminate
number sent to them by their families.
The Committee of Liaison also transmits packages to the prisoners, receipt of
which has been acknowledged in letters
from the pilots. Among the items permitted are toilet articles, dried foods (including camping goods such as freeze-dried
sliced peaches), vitamins, medicines,
clothing, games, art supplies, chess sets,
and air mattresses.
Cora Weiss, co-chairwoman of the
Committee of Liaison, described instances where U.S. Government officials
have actually interfered with the flow of
mail and packages between P.O.W.'s and
their families. (P.O.W. Hearings, pp.
237-238) Customs officials have seized

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Copyright belongs to the individuals who created them or the organizations for which they worked. We share them here strictly for non-profit educational purposes. If you believe that you possess copyright to material included here, please contact us at asklibrary@wisconsinhistory.org. Under the fair use provisions of the U.S. copyright law, teachers and students are free to reproduce any document for nonprofit classroom use. Commercial use of copyright-protected material is generally prohibited.

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Brünn, Harris Watts Collection - Ephemera Soldiers Movements

Full text

POW
by Debby Frazer
It has now been eight years since the
first American pilot was captured in
Indochina. As of Sept 1, 1972 over 500
American men are held as prisoners in
Viet Nam, Cambodia, and Laos. Over
1,200 others are listed as missing in
action.
As the nature of .American involvement in the war changes from ground
combat to air war, thé prisoners take on a
special significance: for many Americans,
they are the only concrete reminder that
the war in Indochina is still going on.
But more than being just a reminder,
the Nixon Administration now claims
that the captured pilots are actually the
reason the war continues:
The only way we're going to get our
P.O.W.'s back is to be doing something
to them [the North Vietnamese] and
that means hitting military targets in
North Viet Nam, retaining a residual
force in South Viet Nam, and continuing
the mining of the harbors of North Viet
Nam. (President Nixon, quoted in The
New York Times, July 9, 1972)
The Legal Question
Destroy the village in order to save it;
bomb the North to get the pilots back.
Such Orwellian logic invites a closer look
at the P.O.W. issue.
They've [the North Vietnamese) already
agreed to abide by the Geneva Conventions, and then have just absolutely
disregarded them. (Secretary of Defense
Melvin Laird, Oct. 22. 1971)
The Geneva Convention Relative to
the Treatment of Prisoners of War
(1949) is the international law governing
treatment of P.O.W.'s. It covers such
areas as mail, packages, inspection of
camps, medical care, and release. The
D.R.V. (Democratic Republic of [North]
Viet Nam) ratified the Convention in
1957, with one reservation: that prisoners
guilty of war crimes or crimes against
humanity, as defined by the Nuremburg
Tribunal, would not be protected by the
Convention.
Because of U.S. bombing of civilian
targets in North Viet Nam, and the use of
antipersonnel bombs against civilians—
both of which are well-documented by
Western journalists—the D.R.V. maintains
that American pilots are not obeying the
international rules of war, which prohibit
such attacks against civilian targets, they
cannot claim protection under those same
rules of war.
The D.R.V. has always insisted, however, that it treats P.O.W.'s humanely.
They say that the basis of their treatment
of the prisoners is humanitarian concern,
since the international law does not apply.
Treatment of P.O.W.'s
Much of the popular concern in the
U.S. with the P.O.W. issue rests on the
fear that American prisoners are being
mistreated. The only evidence for the
charge that the North Vietnamese are
torturing prisoners comes from the statements of one man.
Navy Lieut. Robert F. Frishman, a
former prisoner, was released by the
North Vietnamese in August, 1969. In a
press conference shortly after leaving Viet
Nam, Frishman and fellow ex-prisoner
Apprentice Seaman Douglas B. Hegdahl
stated that food, housing, and medical
treatment had been adequate, and they
assured relatives of the Americans left
behind in the North Vietnamese camps
that they had no cause to worry (AP
report, San Francisco Chronicle, Aug. 6,
1969).
After one month of treatment at
Bethesda Naval Hospital, Frishman
changed his story. During a press conference, he said a fellow pilot, Richard
Stratton, had
been tied up with ropes to such a degree
that he still has large scars on his arms
from rope burns which became infected.
He was deprived of sleep, beaten, had his
fingernails removed, and put in solitary. . . . (American Prisoners of War
in Southeast Asia, 1971; Hearings before
'.he Subcommittee on National Security
Policy and Scientific Developments of
the Committee on Foreign Affairs,
House of Representatives. March and
April, 1971, p. 499. Hereafter called
P.O.W. Hearings.)
Over a year later, after the torture
stories had been through numerous revisions, Frishman told Pulitzer Prize-
winning journalist Seymour Hersh: "I
never said fingernails were pulled out of
Stratton. I never said he lost fingernails."
(P.O.W. Hearings, p. 502.)
The contradictory nature of Frish-
man's statements cast doubt on his credibility. He is also the only one out of nine
prisoners released by the D.R.V. in 1968
and 1969 to make such charges. Other
returned prisoners, such as Hegdahl, have
complained of solitary confinement and
harassment by villagers in areas of heavy
bombing, but none have charged brutality
or torture.
Other released prisoners and American
civilians who have visited P.O.W. camps in
the D.R.V. give favorable reports on
conditions. After a visit with 10 captured pilots, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark stated:
I've seen a lot of prisons in my life.
These 10 men were unquestionably humanely treated, well treated. Their individual rooms were better and bigger than
the rooms in essentially every prison I
have ever visited anywhere. (The New
York Times, Aug. 15, 1972)
The three P.O.W.'s released Sept. 18,
1972 appear to be in good health.
Government Challenges
The U.S. Government challenges the
authenticity of the reports that P.O.W.'s
held by the North Vietnamese are treated
humanely:
If Hanoi wants to demonstrate to the
world that these men are being treated
humanely and are receiving proper medical treatment, it must permit inspections
of prisoner of war camps by impartial
groups. (Secretary of Defense Melvin
Laird, news release, June 6, 1970)
One important reason that the D.R.V.
has refused official inspection of the
P.O.W. camps is their fear that if the
United States knew the location of the
camps, they would conduct more armed
commando raids, such as the one on
Sontay in November, 1970. This fear
appears to be well-grounded:
Question: Do you expect to use
military efforts, that is to say, something
akin to the raid of a week ago?
Answer: We are going to make every
kind of effort to free our prisoners of
war. . . .
Question: You're not ruling out further military action?
Answer: I would not rule out any
action.
"{Secretary--of Defense Melvin Laird answering newsmen's questions, Dec. 1,
1970, shortly after the Sontay raid.)
The Nixon Administration also charges
that North Viet Nam has refused to
provide a list of captured pilots. In fact,
the D.R.V. has provided such a list to
several U.S. Senators, including Edward
Kennedy, and to the Committee of Liaison with Families of Servicemen Detained
in North Viet Nam. The U.S. Government
rejects these lists on the grounds that
they are "unofficial."
American officials also complain, that
the number of letters received by families
is not as high as specified by the Geneva
Convention. There is, however, a regular
flow of mail administered by the Committee of Liaison. As of September, 1972
more than 7,500 letters had been received
from P.O.W.'s, and an indeterminate
number sent to them by their families.
The Committee of Liaison also transmits packages to the prisoners, receipt of
which has been acknowledged in letters
from the pilots. Among the items permitted are toilet articles, dried foods (including camping goods such as freeze-dried
sliced peaches), vitamins, medicines,
clothing, games, art supplies, chess sets,
and air mattresses.
Cora Weiss, co-chairwoman of the
Committee of Liaison, described instances where U.S. Government officials
have actually interfered with the flow of
mail and packages between P.O.W.'s and
their families. (P.O.W. Hearings, pp.
237-238) Customs officials have seized